Olympic Bribery Scandal Chronology

Olympic Bribery Scandal Chronology

The Associated Press

Aug. 03, 1999

June 16, 1995: Salt Lake City wins bid to hold the 2002 Winter Olympics, receiving 54 of the 89 votes cast within the International Olympic Committee.

Nov. 24, 1998: Salt Lake TV station KTVX reports that the Salt Lake Organizing Committee paid for a ``scholarship'' for Sonia Essomba, daughter of the late IOC member Rene Essomba of Cameroon, to attend American University in Washington.

Nov. 25: SLOC chairman Bob Garff, responding to the reports about tuition assistance to IOC relatives, described the program as a ``humanitarian effort'' but denies it was a bribe.

Dec. 8: SLOC President Frank Joklik reveals that 13 individuals received a total of $393,871 in financial aid or scholarships from the committee. Six were relatives of IOC members. The program began in 1991 after Salt Lake City lost the 1998 Olympic bid to Nagano, Japan.

Dec. 12: Top IOC member Marc Hodler alleges that corruption and vote-buying has determined the locations of the Olympics in Atlanta, Nagano, Salt Lake City, and Sydney. He estimates that 5 to 7 percent of IOC members have solicited bribes.

Dec. 13: Samaranch says there was ``no possibility'' that Salt Lake City would be stripped of the 2002 games, regardless of the internal probe's outcome.

Dec. 16: A spokesman for Salt Lake Mayor Deedee Corradini, who was on the SLOC bid committee, says the city hired the son of an IOC member as an intern, later identified as the son of IOC member David Sikhulumi Sibandze of Swaziland.

Jan. 17: Japanese media report that Nagano bid committee spent on average $22,000 per member on each of 62 visiting IOC members _ in violation of strict IOC spending limits. All accounting records were destroyed.

Dec. 21: Samaranch says IOC members will be banned from further travel to Olympic bid cities.

Dec. 22: Former Sen. George Mitchell is selected to head a five-member investigating commission for the U.S. Olympic Committee to look into bribery and corruption allegations.

Dec. 23: The Justice Department and FBI formally open an investigation into whether bribery, fraud or public corruption laws may have been broken by the SLOC.

Jan. 7, 1999: The Associated Press reports that IOC member Jean-Claude Ganga of the Republic of Congo earned $60,000 profit on a land deal arranged through a member of the Salt Lake bid committee. Major sponsor US West says it will withhold a $5 million payment to SLOC until it can answer questions about the allegations.

Jan. 14: Samaranch says nine IOC members face possible expulsion for ``serious'' offenses in the Salt Lake scandal and four others face minor charges. He also says it was the IOC's hope the games stay in Salt Lake City, and that he plans to stay in office until his term expires in 2001. USOC official Alfredo La Mont, the head of international relations, resigns amid allegations he worked with SLOC to secure information about Latin American IOC members.

Jan. 15: Samaranch announces a special IOC meeting on March 17-18 to deal with possible discipline of its members.

Jan. 16: Sponsor US West gives a $5 million check to the SLOC _ a payment the sponsor had previously said it was withholding until it received assurances that the scandal would not interfere with the games.

Jan. 19: Pirjo Haeggman of Finland resigns, the first IOC member to quit in the scandal. Her ex-husband reportedly worked briefly for the Salt Lake bid committee and for 20 months in an Ontario government job initiated by the Toronto committee bidding for the 1996 Summer Games.

Jan. 20: USOC marketing director says two companies that were close to final agreement on Salt Lake City sponsorships had ``asked that the announcement of sponsorship be withheld until the results of the investigation are behind us.''

Jan. 22: Samaranch accepts the resignation of a second IOC member, Bashir Mohamed Attarabulsi of Libya, whose son reportedly received tuition to attend an English language center at Brigham Young and a community college, plus $700 a month for expenses from Salt Lake bidders. It is also disclosed that in 1993, on the night before Sydney won the 2000 Games by two votes over Beijing, the head of the Australian Olympic Committee offered two IOC members $70,000 in inducements to vote for Sydney.

Jan. 23: The IOC begins meeting in Lausanne to consider actions against its members in the scandal.

Jan. 24: IOC recommends the expulsion of six members for violating their Olympic oath in the scandal. A third member, Sibandze, resigns. Three others remain under investigation and a fourth was warned about his actions by the ruling executive board. Samaranch says the Salt Lake City and Sydney games would not be moved, although officials would be sent to Australia to investigate the situation there.

March 1: Mitchell commission says IOC fostered ``a culture of improper gift-giving'' that led to the Salt Lake scandal, calls for reforms including term limits and open financial records.

March 17: Samaranch receives a near-unanimous vote of confidence from committee members at the start of an emergency general assembly on the scandal. Number of expulsions and resignations reaches 10 IOC members.

April 14: In hearings, the Senate Commerce Committee sharply criticizes Olympic leaders for the Salt Lake scandal, with two members urging Samaranch be replaced.

June 19: In the first vote on an Olympics site since the scandal broke, the IOC selects Turin, Italy as host for the 2006 Winter Games over the front-runner, Sion, Switzerland. The election is seen as a backlash against the Swiss-based IOC and Hodler.

Aug. 3: In the first criminal case resulting from the scandal, Utah businessman David Simmons pleads guilty to a federal misdemeanor tax charge and tells the court he helped create a sham job for the son of powerful IOC member Kim Un-yong. Simmons, who agrees to cooperate with authjorities, says the job was financed by Salt Lake Olympic bidders to try to influence Kim's vote.